I'm one of those guys who likes a lot of different cars, but doesn't really have a single favorite. Don't get me wrong — I'm much more of a Porsche 911 man than a Chrysler 200 man, if you catch my drift! (Do you catch my drift?) But now I've come across something I simply must own, and it is this 1977 Lancia Beta Scorpion!

If you're an America, you may be asking yourself — What the shit is a Lancia Scorpion? Great question! It's a Pininfarina-designed rear-engine sports car that was produced from 1975 to 1981 and was called the Lancia Montecarlo in its native Europe. Chevrolet's Monte Carlo necessitated a name change when it came to the U.S.

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Lancias in general are relatively rare in America since seemingly none of them were designed to last six months past their production date. And I'd wager that with less than 8,000 built in total, the Scorpion is even rarer.

That's why this lovely example with just 12,000 miles on eBay caught my eye. Invest in it and you get a 1.8-liter turbo four cylinder engine, a five-speed transmission, an AM/FM cassette stereo (AM AND FM!), an Abarth steering wheel, Euro-style headlamps, a new paint job, no rust, a frunk and a guarantee of mechanical quality:

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Mechanically this car is better than new. Many modifications (beyond the
turbocharger) have been done including the porting and relieving of the
cylinder head, the addition of the power windows, and the installation of
special dual master cylinders for the brakes. All of this has been done
to aircraft specifications in a most professional and visually appealing
manner. Our overall rating of the mechanical condition of this car:
EXCELLENT.

But most importantly, you get a sweet-ass red leather interior, baby.

Yeah. Hell yeah. They don't make the insides of cars like they used to.

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The turbocharged, rust-free (for now) Scorpion can be yours for the extremely reasonable price of just $12,000. As of this writing, it's going for a mere $7,500 on eBay. What a steal! God, I'm so tempted to buy this.

Better yet, someone buy it for me. So what if it may be about the most unreliable car to ever come out of Italy? Should we manage by the grace of God to keep it running, it will make a great addition to the Jalopnik long term test fleet. Scorpion!